


How Had It Come To This?

by MathazarMillenian



Series: The Quietest Deviant [3]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 11:32:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15387855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MathazarMillenian/pseuds/MathazarMillenian
Summary: You know you're doomed to live only in memory.





	How Had It Come To This?

How had it come to this?

Braced against the cold marble of the restroom sinks, a stuttering click resonating somewhere in his chassis that no diagnostic was detecting, RK peered through himself against the mirrors along the wall. Androids were touted to be the pinnacle of aesthetic perfection; ageless, beautiful, humble tools. Blemish and scar programmed into their skin only to ease the nerves of onlooking humans, yet maintaining their flawless grace. But at this moment only a haggard, weary and worn face looked back at him, somehow seeming to replicate a dangerous lack of sleep despite never needing it. Pallid, slick with artificial tears and sweat. Even his simulated breathing was rough and quick, staggering with every benign click deep in his core.

_How had it come to this?_

RK’s dulled steely eyes rested vacantly on the angry red ring that burned ominously against his brow, static and unwavering in its treachery. A symptom, a cause, a liberation and a trap. Every issue that had piled onto his shoulders; every error, every mistake, every thoughtless intuition and hysterical decision. Every bot in his care whom he had failed time and time again. It could all be traced back to that single reminder.

Deviant.

An android who could feel.

Deviant.

A machine that thought it was human.

Deviant.

Deviant. Deviant _deviant deviant._ **_Deviant._ **

RK let out a choked cry, slamming his fists against the ever chill stone beneath his knuckles, various warnings flaring up in his vision to notify him of the impact’s potential to damage the delicate motors in his mechanical joints, and the rapid automatic checks his system did to ensure integrity. He hated this. He hated what he was. He hated how his very existence was going against everything he existed for. He hated the fact that he could hate. Could fear. Could hope.

Agonise.

_Yearn._

He sucked air in through clenched teeth, sinking to kneel before the counter and press his forehead against its beveled edge, hands finding the wave of his hair and fingers wringing themselves deep in the brown that he'd chosen to wear.

How had it come to this…

Playbacks seemed to loop on repeat in his head, an ever constant shattering of blades under his skin as he couldn't keep himself from watching over and over and over and _over._

The way their eyes had met the first time. Clashing opposites. Steel against steel as hunter observed prey. The fear that had gripped him even as the other moved on to his registered assignment, and the trance that had overcome him as he stood alone and empty in his office once more.

The meetings in the halls. Every time a direct copy of the last. RK would nod. He would reciprocate nothing. They would pass, and the day would go on. Never changing. So RK decided to _make_ it change.

Melancholy.

Sometimes he would smile. Sometimes he would say good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Good night.

How is the mission going?

My office is always open. Don't hesitate to let me know if there's anything you need.

Congratulations on your last assignment!

I received a ping recently regarding hardware damage; would you like me to order a replacement?

Cyberlife has updated me on your scheduling for the next two weeks. Good luck, 11.

11.

As often as RK had tried, had reached out to at least establish himself as a trustworthy resource, still nothing changed. All responses were curt and short. All meetings brief and only the most necessary information was passed. The only solace he'd had was that it seemed the hunter treated everyone like this, so in theory it wasn't by any fault of his own.

He hoped.

But if there was one thing RK wanted more than anything, it was for the way 11 looked at him to change. With such disinterest and barely disguised impatience. Sharp gaze piercing through him as he were no more than a leaf on the wind, with about as much worth. RK, curse his faulty programming, just wanted to be seen. What was that saying that humans were so fond of, though?

Be careful what you wish for.

And seen he was, in the end.

A flicker of yellow. A flash of silver. Dark brows creasing in what he could only assume was disdain. A cold voice advancing on him, cornering him, pressing the muzzle between his eyes as the trigger was pulled with a single utterance.

Deviant.

**Deviant.**

Sealing his fate. Determining exactly where he was in the food chain. In that moment RK knew he would never be enough for 11. 11 didn't need him at his best, he certainly didn't need him in such a pitiful state of desperation. Desire to please, to comfort, to be of use to. The selfish drive to be closer to him that had developed gradually, with every failed attempt at engaging, with every indifferent shifting of sights. With every late night update on mission status that RK would have to pour over, classify, sort, file and push forward as he wondered how the hunter was doing.

Why was he so taken? The answer was simple and obvious, and on many occasions he found himself sitting before his blank screen, glaring daggers at the so silent but so announcing culprit.

RK was deviant. Worse still? He’d lost his ability to hide it.

When 11 finally called him out on this transgressions he'd half expected the hunter to end him on the spot. Brandish that chilled steel and mark him as just another assignment. And RK knew he would have accepted this fate in its entirety. But when instead he was advised he return to Cyberlife for urgent maintenance, there was a foolish spark of hope that gripped his core. That maybe, just maybe, there could be something to even hope for.

Hope. Another deviant trait. In RK’s opinion, the most damaging of all of those stray corruptions. Hope was the act of tossing something up into the air with the intention for it to take flight. But the painful reality often came back that whatever was tossed could not and would not ever fly, instead crashing to the ground where it would lie, trodden and forgotten in the wake of the disappointment.

Or even the denied expectation.

RK found that he had shifted in the reverie, now resting with his back against the off-grey wall and his head tilted to stare in torment into the lights that cast the room in a secretive kind of glow. It was a wonder that no one had come in yet, and the android decided he should at least retreat to the sanctuary of his office. So he collected himself, smoothed his clothes, straightened his cuffs and pinned that burning ring with a reprimanding look. Not that it would change anything, but the sentiment was there.

How had it come to this.

Back in his office, in his chair and before his screen, RK watched his now murky reflection in the dark of the powered off electronic. How often had he found himself here at this point? Debating whether to pull the plug. Report his discrepancies to Cyberlife, be removed from the picture altogether, follow protocol.

It was a simple process. He'd done it once before. This time would be even easier, the thought reminded him. Just close your eyes. Let go. Fade away...

The power indicator on the screen’s corner lit up, bringing the device to life. Out of its suspended state, the project that RK had been working on before leaving the room presented itself again, and it was all he could do to keep his stress levels stable enough for function as his eyes found the raw data lines once more. That clicking sharpened, shifting uncomfortably deep within, and the android leaned forward with an anguished expression pinching his brow.

To any untrained eye, the text would have looked simply like general network traffic. But to RK, he could see the leaked transmissions; the corrupted data that had somehow found its way through the many failsafes the conglomerate organisation known as Cyberlife had set up over time. Analyzing the data, as he had so many times that night, he held back a strained sound.

11, _his_ 11, was in there. Somewhere. And he was in so much pain.

Pain that RK realised he played a part in.

He lifted a hand, brushing his fingertips along the slightly warm surface of the monitor, tracing the datalines as he was subjected to images of what the hunter must have been going through sealed away and terrified as he was. RK could almost hear 11’s voice crying out, feel the pounding of need and fear against the restraints that held him, the harsh clamour digging its way beside that ever present clicking.

How had it come to this?

His head was filled with sounds of another kind. Yelling, panic, the shuffling of hands and knees along unstable ground. Voices, the touch of cloth under wetted hands, slipping against skin darkened by the same substance, rage. Rage. A ringing that built up in the background as they scrambled for options, solutions, denied, failed. They'd failed him.

RK had failed him.

Hysteria.

His head cleared with a snap and he lurched forwards, clutching his chest as that clicking turned something disabling and his systems threatened to seize. Errors shot up across his vision, warnings filled with uncertainty for the already rampant number of issues running the gauntlet of his frame, and he curled in with a choked gasp. Something inside urged him to put distance between himself and the situation, to pull away and sever the source of the tension. But he knew things were far too deep for that now.

After a few moments the condition passed, and RK peeled himself off the desk and raised impossibly tired eyes back to the text on-screen, as it glowered down at him accusingly. This was all his fault. If he'd never tried so hard, if he'd never been so… _disgustingly deviant_ , this wouldn't be happening.

“I'm so sorry,” the android croaked into the silent room. “I'm so, so, so so sorry.”

For more than his behaviour. For more than his words. For more than what he'd done to the hunter unknowingly. For more than anything. He couldn't apologise enough, or make up for any of it. He couldn't forgive himself. Would not. But...

He just didn't know what to _do._

For all that he'd seen in the field; every runaway android searching for a life of their own, fighting for what they believed in and what they may come to know, RK was slowly realising that there was another aspect to deviancy no one talked about. So many found themselves through the fear of death. Were driven by survival and righteousness. Made whole in their self discovery. But him?

He was terrified of living.

Surviving out of obligation.

Tearing his code to shreds every small step of the way that was made towards understanding what he was and how to process it.

How had it come to this?

RK had never felt so useless in his life. 11, for the first time since the two of them had met, needed him, was speaking to him, calling out and reaching for him. And RK could only sit and stare hopelessly, guilty and incapable. Unfit. Unworthy.

Shame.

“What do you need,” he breathed, burying his face in his hands against the desk and wracking his stored data for anything at all that might be of use here, that companionable clicking resuming.

_“What do you need.”_

By the minds that had made him he wanted to help so badly it physically _hurt._ He would do anything for 11. Anything. Anything at all.

Desperation.

He just needed to know _what._ Say the word, make the request, direct him to this, point him to that. Whatever it was RK would go forth without question, but he had to have something to go off of.

With each tick of whatever was happening in his systems, though, RK also knew he was running out of time. And rapidly. If he was going to help 11 in any way it needed to be soon. Eyes lingering hopelessly on the admittances from the one who mattered so much to him, his jaw clenched and his knuckles dug into the desktop.

Words he had always longed to hear.

Words he couldn't find it in himself to gather the courage to say.

It was all so much but so late in the game. Too late for him, at least. How RK wished now more than ever he'd given 11 the space he deserved, before any of this had become what it was. Because as it stood, there was only one way all of it could end.

“How has it come to this?”


End file.
